Seminar on Contemporary Geographic

Issues (GeEs 4021)

Definition of the term seminar
A seminar is defined as a gathering of people for
the purpose of discussing a stated topic.
A seminar is a form of academic instruction,
either at an academic institution or offered by a
commercial or professional organization.
Seminar is an advanced group technique which is
usually used in higher education.
 Purpose of Seminar
• To promote the independent learning
• To get students involved in discussions.
• To provide a forum for students to ask questions
and get their discussion results.
• To foster responsibility for one’s own learning.
• To make students feel like they are parts of a group.
• To provide an opportunity for arguments.
• To expand on material introduced in large lectures,
but to reach more depth
 Advantages Seminar
• It promotes analytical thinking, communication skills,
experience skills and creativity among student
• Gives good motivation and learning experience.
• Help to evaluate the learn-ability of learners.
• Regulate the creating and organizing of facts and
information.
• Dissemination and retrieval of information is
scientifically managed.
• Develop the self reliance and self confidence.
• Also inculcates the responsibility and cooperative
nature.
• It is the best for socialization.
 Types of Seminar

Seminars can be classified in to

four types
• Mini Seminar
• Major Seminar
• National Seminar and
• International Seminar
 1.Mini Seminar
• Its coverage and scope are small and simple
• A discussion held over the topic taught or to
be taught with the students is known as Group
discussion.
• It gives the students training in questioning
skills, organizing the information and
presentation skills of seminar.
• A mini seminar is felt necessary because it
gives good experience to conduct a major
seminar at Institutional level.
 2. Major Seminar
• These types of seminars are conducted by
institutional or departmental level for a
specific topic or subject is known as Major
seminar.
• Usually students and teachers are
participating in this type of seminar.
• This major seminar can be organized at
department level for every month.
• A specific topic or subject is selected for the
theme of the seminar.
 3. National Seminar
• An association of any kind particularly with
academic or professional interest or an
organization (Government, Firm, etc.,)
conducts this type of seminar at National
level is called National seminar.
• The subject experts are invited to the seminar
for discussion.
• The Secretary of the seminar prepares the
schedule and functionaries for seminar.
 4. Inter- National Seminar

• Usually the seminar is conducted by an

international organization or agency is known
as International seminar.
• Theme of this seminar has wider aspects.
Globalization, Renovation, Atomic energy
agreements, Policies implementation and
modification etc., are examples for themes of
International seminars.
• A Nation or its body can conduct or organize
the international seminar.
 A contemporary issue
• Refers to an issue that is currently affecting
people or places and that is unresolved.
• Contemporary geographical issues and events
have both a spatial and temporal dimension.
• The study of geography, by its very nature,
covers a range of contemporary issues and
events.
• These issues are:
 Events that are 'in the news'

 Discussed and debated widely in the

community
 Local community-based issue (such as a
development proposal)
 Issue that affects the whole planet (for
example, global climate change)
 1. Concepts of Geography
What are core concepts in geography?
Geography has been given different
definitions by different scholars in different
time
• Geography is the science of the earth’s
surface, form, physical features, natural and
political divisions, climate, production,
population, etc. (Oxford Dictionary, 1964).
 Definition...

• Geography explores the relationship between the

earth and its people through the study of place,
space & environment.
• Geographers ask questions such as where, what,
how and why(Geography working group’s interim report, 1990).
• Geography is concerned to provide accurate,
orderly and rational description and interpretation
of the variable character of the earth
surface(Hartshorne, 1959).
• Geography is the study of relations b/n society and
the natural environment (Peet, 1998).
 Foundation of Geographic Study
• The foundations of geography can be traced to
the ancient cultures
 The ancient
 Medieval
 Modern
• Geographical phenomenon started long before
the introduction of the subject geography to the
university.
 A. Geography in Ancient World
• Greeks…Herodotus (485-425). As a father of
history he recorded historical events in
geographical settings.
• Alexandria… Eratosthenes (276-194) Able to
calculate the circumference of the earth.
• He developed coordinate systems for the
world based on latitude and longitude which
enabled him to make the first possibly
accurate map
• Alexandria…Ptolemy (90-168 AD) Improved the work
of Eratosthenes.
• Wrote the principles of divisions of latitude and
longitude in to degrees and the calculation of
distances.
• Discussed map projections made maps of the world.
• However his longitudinal measurement was full of
errors due to rejecting Eratosthenes accurate
estimation
• Romans…Starbo (64 BC-20 AD).In his work of "17
volumes geographical“
• He explained Cultural differences over space,
government, society, cultural development and the
significance of natural conditions.
 B. Geography in Middle World

• Middle East…Ibn Batuta (1304-68)

Travelled as far as China and south of the
equator along the east coast disproving the
claim that this part of the earth is too hot for
human habitation.
• Greeks…Al Idrisi (1099-1180) Wrote a
descriptive geography and introduced a more
sophisticated world climatic zones that what
the Greeks suggested (two cold zones, two
temperate zone and one torrid zone)
• Middle East….Al Muqaddasi (945-88). He
made extensive travel and observation in
the Arab land and most of his documents
were first hand information unlike his
predecessors
• Arab….Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406). He was
interested in historical geography and
wrote about the rise and fall of states in their
geographical settings.
 During the time of renaissance

• Geography was revived and major travelers of

the time were used Ptolemy’s map this led to
the new improvements of cartography which
resulted from new discoveries and filling the
information gap between the middle age and
the renaissance.
 C. Geography in the Modern World
• philosophical foundation for the belief that the
subject geography has a significant scientific
contribution.
• Immanuel Kant: In his popular lecture on
physical geography
• Classification of phenomenon based on their
nature is call logical classification and the other
one is physical classification.
• Physical classification gives scientific basis for
history and geography
• Kant gave a theoretical justification for
geography
• Humboldt: was mainly considered as
cosmographer (the study of the universe)
rather than seen as a geographer.
• Humboldt is mainly interested in natural
sciences dealing with the underpinning
relationship between plants, animals, and
human kinds with climate, topography and
altitude.
• Hence Humboldt’s greatest contribution was
in systematic physical geography
• Karl Ritter: Unlike Humboldt Ritter was mainly
concerned with human geography.
• Like Immanuel Kant, Ritter’s view of the world is
teleological which means understanding events
in relation to their underlying purposes designed
for.
• He regarded the earth as an educational model
for humanity, where nature had a God given
purpose which was to show humanity
development.

*Teleology = the study of ultimate causes in nature

• According to Ritter the shape of continents
are not accidental but designed by God and
this design and their relative location enabled
them to play the role for which they are
designed for.
• Carl Ritter’s main contribution is on regional
geography.
• Alexander von Humboldt and Carl Ritter laid
the scientific foundation of Geography as a
branch of knowledge
 Paradigms in Geography
• Paradigms refer to the idea that academic
disciplines move through phases of development
characterized by different assumptions about
how work should proceed.
• Moving from one paradigm to another demands
a fundamental re-conceptualization of the world
by academics
• There is a need to look the world in a new way
and learn a new language for talking about it.
There are two main paradigms :
I. The traditional paradigm
(1) exploration paradigm ,
(2) environmentalism paradigm and
(3) regionalism paradigm .
II. The contemporary paradigm.
(1) the quantitative paradigm and
(2) quantitative and qualitative paradigm .
 Exploration Paradigm
• It is the early development of the " geographical
thought”
• In this time the efforts of mapping , delineation of
new places that have not been widely known and
collection of basic facts relating to areas previously
not been widely known.
• Appeared the writings , drawings , maps and
exciting new areas that foster a strong motivation
for researchers
 Paradigm of Environmentalism
• Demanded researchers to conduct more in-
depth research on elements of the physical
environment in which human life takes place.
• Where opinions about the role of the physical
environment to patterns of human activity on
the surface resonated very real.
• It is then known as a geographical determinism
mindset
Territorial paradigm(Regionalism Paradigm )

• This paradigm is the last phase of development

of the traditional paradigm .
• efforts led to the synthesis of the human
relationship with the environment on the other
hand seems coloring this paradigm .
• Regional concepts emerged as the basis of a
more detailed introduction .
• Region in terms of its type ( formal and
functional regions ),
Contemporary Paradigm development

• At this time began the new developments in the

field of quantitative analysis methods and
building models.
• Development paradigm in Geography during
the period is also referred to as spatial analysis
paradigm ( the spatial analysis paradigm )
• Periods of growth and development of the
quantitative analysis of the incorporation of
quantitative and qualitative analysis .
 Quantitative paradigm
• Emerged with the advent of the quantitative
revolution with the invention of electronic
calculators and new analysis techniques .
• The variables analyzed more limited and specific
nature hypothesis presented in accordance with,
so the results are limited to the previously stated
hypothesis test.
• This is one of the weaknesses of this paradigm
where the researcher was not able to reveal its
association with other variables that actually exist
in the real world .
• Based on this, the experts recognize the
importance of qualitative analysis as
something that complements the quantitative
analysis to be able to understand the real
world that is the focus of the study Geography
.
• Exploration
• Environmental Determinism
• Regionalism
• Quantitative Revolution
• Behaviouralism
• Humanism
• Structuration theory
• Political Economy theory
• Livelihood approach
• Practical Geography
1.2 Geographical Themes and Standards

• Geographers use five major themes, or ideas,

to organize and guide their studies.
 Location,
 Place,
 Human-Environment Interaction,
 Movement, and
 Regions.
 1.Location
• A description of where it is? location is
expressed in two ways
• An absolute Location.
• Relative Location
2. Place
 Place, is closely related to Location.
 It refers to the area’s landscape, the features
that define the area and make it different
from other places.
• Such features could include land, climate, and
people.
• For example, Addis Ababa, is our nation’s
capital and has many great monuments.
 Physical characteristics (landforms, bodies of
water, climate, soil, natural vegetation, animal
life)
 Human characteristics (population density,
languages, religion, culture, political systems)
 3. Human-Environment Interaction
• What is the relationship between humans and their
environment?
• How people and their physical environment affect
each other?
• People interact with their environment every day in all
sorts of ways.
A. How humans depend on the environment (basic
needs of food, shelter, clothing)
B. How humans modify the env’t (construct dams,
irrigate fields, dig mines, build houses)
C. How humans adapt to the environment (air
conditioning in the Southwest)
 4. Movement
• The physical movement of people (human race
move to inhabit all the continents and islands of
the world.)
• Transportation and communication systems
(highways, rivers, air & ship routes, telephone
lines)
• People(ideas, migration)
 5. Regions
• How and why is one area similar to, or
different from, another area?
• Regions are areas that share common
characteristics.
A. Physical characteristics: climate, landforms
(the desert Southwest, the peaks and valleys
of the Rocky Mountains)
B. Human characteristics: economic & political
systems, social & cultural concerns
 The Standards and Essential Elements in Geography

• The five themes are not the only system

geographers use to study the world.
• Scholars have divided the study of geography into
six parts called “The Six Essential Elements of
Geography.”
• There are Six Essential Elements of Geography
1.The World in Spatial Terms,
2.Places and Regions,
3.Physical Systems,
4.Human Systems,
5.Environment and Society, and
6. The Uses of Geography.
 1. The World in Spatial Terms
• a. How to use maps and other geographic
representations, tools, and technologies to
acquire, process, and report information from
a spatial perspective
• b. How to use mental maps to organize
information about people, places, and
environments in a spatial context
• c. How to analyze the spatial organization of
people, places, and environments on earth’s
surface
 2. Places and Regions

• a. The physical and human characteristics of

places
• b. That people create regions to interpret
earth’s complexity
• c. How culture and experience influence
people’s perceptions of places and regions
 3. Physical Systems

• a. The physical processes that shape the

patterns of earth’s surface
• b. The characteristics and spatial
distribution of ecosystems on earth’s
surface
 4. Human Systems
• a. The characteristics, distribution, and migration
of human populations on earth’s surface
• b. The characteristics, distribution, and
complexity of earth’s cultural mosaics
• c. The patterns and networks of economic
interdependence on earth’s surface
• d. The processes, patterns, and functions of
human settlement
• e. How the forces of cooperation and conflict
among people influence the division and control
of earth’s surface
 5. Environment and Society

• a. How human actions modify the physical

environment
• b. How physical systems affect human systems
• c. The changes that occur in the meaning, use,
distribution, and importance of resources
 6. The Uses of Geography

• a. Understand the relationships among

people, places, and environments over time
• b. How to apply geography to interpret the
past
• c. How to apply geography to interpret the
present and plan for the future
Key concepts related to term paper thematic issues

• This section focuses on how to prepare a term

paper for seminar using contemporary
geographic issues.
• To come up with good term paper it requires a
lot of hard work, extensive reading and
thinking.
• Term Paper writing method
• What is Seminar Paper?
• A seminar paper is the written analysis of a
particular topic specified in the seminar.
• A seminar paper is also an excellent
opportunity to exercise scientific writing
before writing a thesis.
• A seminar paper should start with a title page
and a table of contents, and it should end with
a literature list.
• The general steps are as follows:
 Identify an interesting topic
 Gather information
 Recognize the problem(s)
 Provide quotations:
 General organization:
the basic elements of seminar paper :
introduction, the body of the research, and
discussion of the findings and other assessor
parts.
A. Title:
 should be concise
 informative and precisely defined.
 concretely shows the subject of research
 briefly points to the essence of content.
B. Abstract:
• Give the objectives, your findings and the
significance of your paper.
• usually consisting 300-500 words
C. Introduction:
• Give background information
• Motive for the subject, actuality of the
subject, problem, aims, scope of research,
previous and expected results.
D. Main body:
• This is said to be “the text body/subject
development.
• Present your ideas in a systematic and concise
manner.
E. Discussion and conclusion:
• Give a summary of your ideas, compare and
contrast yours with that of other studies.
• Suggest future directions and provide
thoughtful discussion about the implications
of your suggestions.
F. References:
• The detailed description of the document
from which you have obtained your
information.
• Referencing is a way of demonstrating that
you have done that reading.
• Text citations:
• Single author (Smithson, 2008)
• Two authors (Smithson and Thompson, 2008)
• Three or more authors (Smithson et al., 2008)
• Multiple references (Smithson et al., 2008a; Smithson
et al., 2008b; Jones et al., 2003)
Contemporary thematic issues for term paper preparation

• Population
• Environment
• Development
• Geopolitics
• Natural Resource Management
• Globalization
• Eco-Tourism
• Urbanization and its Problems
• Poverty and Environment
• Climate Change and Adaptation
• Food Security
• Urban and regional Planning and its
Application in LDCS
• Watershed mgt& irrigation schemes
• Migration and Livelihoods
• Resettlement and Livelihoods
 1. Population

• Population: is a collective term referring to

the total number or specified group of people
or of animals or of plants living in an area at a
particular time.
• Our focus in this course is on human
population. Basically all we belong to the
human population, hence by studying
population geography you must feel like
studying ourselves.
• Any change occurring in human population
affects all aspects of human life.
 2. Environment

• The environment is everything surrounding

the organism including living and non-living
things and the human-made things as well as
concrete and abstract things; those things can
affect directly and indirectly the organism.
 3. Development

• There is no a single agreed up on definition for the

term “development”.
• Many scholars defined and conceptualize
development differently depending on their
understanding.
• However, there are some popular definitions which
have been accepted by many peoples and scholars.
Development is the extent to which resources of a country
is brought in to a productive manner to raise the quality of
life of the people.

Development is a process by which members of a society

increase their personal and institutional capabilities to
mobilize and manage resources to produce sustainable
improvement in their quality of life.

Development is the full and more productive use of one’s

resource by using advanced technology and there by
improve the life condition and well-being of the society.
• Development is to improve the quality of life of
majority of the population.
• Any change that benefits a few section of a
society may not be considered as “development‟.
 The Concept of Sustainable Development
The term “sustainability” derived from the Latin
root, sus-tinere, which means to “under-hold” or
hold up from underneath, implying robustness
and durability over time.
Accordingly, sustainability depicts a paradigm that
seeks to protect the planet’s life support systems
to ensure longevity for humans and other species.
 Sustainable development can be defined as
the ability to make development to meets the
needs of the present without compromising
the ability of the future generations to meet
their own needs”.
 4.Natural Resource Management
• Natural resource management refers to the
management of natural resources with a
particular focus on how management affects
the quality of life for both present and future
generations.
• Natural resource management specifically
focuses on a scientific and technical
understanding of resources and ecology and
the life-supporting capacity of those
resources.
• Conservation of natural resources is the major
focus of natural capitalism, environmentalism,
the ecology movement, and green politics.
 5. Globalization
• Globalization has multifaceted definitions. Hence,
the following definitions are good to understand
the general concepts of globalization.
1. Globalization is the acceleration and
intensification of interaction and integration
among the people, companies, and governments
of different nations. This process has effects on
human well-being, environment, culture
(including ideas, religion, and political systems),
and on economic development.
2.Globalization - westernization. As such, globalization is
regarded as a particular type of universalization, one in
which the social structures of modernity (capitalism,
industrialism, rationalism, urbanism, etc.) are spread
the over world, destroying pre-existent cultures and
local self-determination in the process.
3. Globalization is also defined as universalization. In this
case, globalization is taken to describe a process of
dispersing various objects and experiences to people
at all inhabited parts of the earth.
On these lines, global means worldwide and everywhere.
Hence there is a “globalization‟ of business suits, curry
dinners, Barbie dolls, anti-terrorism legislation, and so
on.
4. Globalization is also defined as liberalization.
In this case, globalization denotes a process of
removing officially imposed restrictions on
movements of resources between countries in
order to form an “open‟ and “borderless‟
world economy.
5. Finally, Globalization is also defined as
internationalizations. In this case, globalization
refers to the growth of transaction and
interdependency between countries.
 6. Eco-tourism
• The International Ecotourism Society defines
Ecotourism as: "responsible travel to natural
areas that conserves the environment and
improves the welfare of local people".
• It can also mean "Nature-based tourism that
involves education and interpretation of the
natural environment and is managed to be
ecologically sustainable”.
 According to Martha Honey (2008), the seven
defining points for eco-tourism are:
• Involves travel to natural destinations
• Minimizes Impact
• Builds environmental awareness
• Provides direct financial benefits for
conservation
• Provides financial benefits and empowerment
for local people
• Respects local culture
• Supports human rights and democratic
movements
 7. Urbanization and its Problems
• Urbanization is a process of becoming urban
where rural areas become transformed into
urban areas.
• In general usage, urbanization refers to the
relative concentration of a territory's
population, which engaged in non-agricultural
activities, in towns and cities.
• Numerically expressed, urbanization denotes
the increases in the share of the population that
resides in urban areas predominantly because
of net rural to urban migration (UNFPA, 2007).
 8 Poverty and Environment
• Poverty, low agricultural productivity and
natural resources degradation are severely
interrelated problems in less favored areas of
the world.
– Most of the semiarid tropics of Africa and South
Asia
– Mountainous areas in South America and Asia
– Much of the high lands of East and central Africa
– Hill side areas in central America and SE Asia, and
– Large portions of the humid tropics of Africa and
Latin America
 Poverty…..
• Poverty refers to lacking enough resources to
provide the necessities of life—food, clean
water, shelter and clothing.
• But in today’s world, that can be extended to
include access to health care, education and
even transportation.
• In government circles, poverty is often further
defined as “absolute poverty” and “relative
poverty”
• The World Bank keeps a metric called the
International Poverty Line and, as of 2015, set
the definition of extreme poverty as those
who live on less than US$1.90 per day.
• Those living on between $1.90-$3.10 per day
are classified as the “moderate poor.”
• This number is based on the monetary value
of a person’s consumption rather than income
alone.
• Absolute poverty refers to those whose
incomes fall below a line set by a given
country. Below this line people are unable to
meet their basic needs for food, water and
shelter. They also have no access to social
services such as health care, education and
utilities.
• Relative poverty refers to people whose total
incomes are less than a certain percentage
• When poverty is defined to include access to
services and security critical to well-being—
and not just income and consumption
 9.Climate Change and Adaptation
• Climate change refers to a large-scale change in
one or more basic climate components, such as
temperature or precipitation.
• Climate change is perfectly natural and has taken
place many times over the geological record.
• climate change refers to drastic or secular changes
in heat balance of the earth-atmosphere system,
moisture, cloudiness and precipitation caused by
either external factors such as variations in orbital
characteristics of the earth, solar variability
(fluctuations in radiation from the photosphere of
the sun), tectonic process
 Adaptations to climate change

• Adapting to climate change will entail

adjustments and changes at every level from
community to national and international.
Communities must build their resilience,
including adopting appropriate technologies
while making the most of traditional
knowledge, and diversifying their livelihoods
to cope with current and future climate stress.
 10 .Food Security
• It is the ability of all people at all times to access
enough food for an active and healthy life.
• It is estimated that 18 million people worldwide,
most of whom are children, die each year due to
starvation or malnutrition, and many others
suffer a variety of dietary deficiencies.
• The earth can only supply a limited amount of
food.
• Food must be available, each person must have
access to it and the food utilized must fulfill
nutritional requirement
 11.Geopolitics
• Political geography is a systematic field, one of the
oldest in geography, focuses on the spatial
expressions of political behavior.
• Modern political geography also focuses on
political behavior and the way this varies across
the cultural landscape.
• Political geography recognizes six entities - power,
politics , policy, space, place and territory are
intrinsically linked, but a piece of political
geographical research does not need to explicitly
address them all.